Archive for the Category 'Silver Coins'

Montana was the nearest neighbor to the underground bank for silver coins.

Religious differences drove father and son apart. Seldon went into the service and came back to be a salesman. World War II was the ending of a great depression/recession in the land. Veterans were just as jobless as boys who didn’t serve. Seldon started selling vacuum cleaners and remained successful because of his dad’s training that he called “sticktoitivness”.

As the years rolled by Seldon noticed the vending business had advanced since the war and there was now more than bubblegum machines and M&Ms. Cigarettes, candy bars, soda pop, coffee and crackers were now available in vending machines.

Seldon traveled to the capital of Minnesotan’s Empire to visit the vending machines sales capital of the United States. It was a small investment compared to normal sales, but it was the first day of building an empire for Seldon. The truck and trailer were full. Seldon took two weeks off from selling vacuum cleaners and proceeded to set up vending machines all over the capital of his state.

Upon arriving a few days later Seldon saw his vending machines setting idle empty of product for sale but full of silver cash. For the next 23 years Seldon filled every machine with pop, candy, cigarettes and coffee and emptied every cash drawer. Seldon was the only vendor who had vending machines in this city for 23 years. I met Seldon on one of my business trips, stayed in the same motel every week, Seldon rented room and a suite in this motel, as we became acquainted we began to take our meals together. (circa 1976)

One evening Seldon asked if I’d give him a hand, placing silver coins in his underground bank for I said,” sure”, and the story begins. Seldon took me down to the little room that he rented which was no bigger than a broom closet, 6 feet wide, 8 foot deep. The floor was stacked two 5 gallon buckets deep, full of silver coins for the underground bank. (Seldon had a machine that sifted the silver coins from nichols). Seldon needed me to help him load these 5 gallon buckets in the back of his station wagon. Because of the weight we were only able to take eight buckets at a time.

20 minutes outside of town in the dark we arrived at a barn. Seldon got out and reached into the grass and unscrewed a 2” galvanized pipe cap. Seldon had brought along a huge galvanized funnel that he inserted in the pipe. Slowly we began to dump the 5 gallon pails into the funnel. My inquisitive nature couldn’t hold back, “what’s down there Seldon?”

Seldon said that he had buried a chest freezer with a metal pipe welded in the lid with backhoe. “What you do when it gets full?”

He said I’ll bury another one, there is five around this barn now.

On the way back to town, Seldon recounted a story about his father, who was a farmer that cleared the land and removed rocks to the edge of the field to make a fence out of stones.

When Seldon inherited the land, he hired a front end loader and a dump truck to scoop up the rock fence. As the loader pushed into the rocks Seldon noticed a pipe being pushed out the other side. He tried to lift the pipe but it was too heavy. So the loader operator helped Seldon lift one end on to the bucket, and then the other end. Seldon said “let’s take it to the barn”, where the pipe was put in a vice and a pipe wrench was used to attempt to take off the cap. The cap would not budge. A torch was eventually used to cut the cap off the end of the pipe. The glow of gold coins supplied the reason the pipe was too heavy to lift by hand. It turns out the Seldon’s father refused to comply with the gold act of 1935 and surrender his gold coins, using instead the stone fence as his gold vault. Seldon’s father had passed away eight years prior to tearing down the stone fence. He had never told Seldon the gold was in the pipe under the stone fence.

So I asked Seldon, “are you to tell your children about that silver coins that you have buried by the barn, “Nope, he replied, that’s my retirement let them earn their own!”

I talked with Seldon five years ago, he was 89. We did not discuss the barn,his bank or his retirement. Somewhere next door to Montana there is several million dollars silver coin waiting for the new owner to uncover. (These coins are all prior to the clad coins)

It turns out Seldon’s retirement was well-placed. Six months after helping Seldon deposit in his underground bank, an organization came to town and offered to buy Seldon’s vending business. He was told this would be their only offer and that it was too good for him to refuse. Seldon sold his vending business and went back to selling vacuum cleaners, he said it gave him something to do…